He recoiled half a step, startled by the violence in my voice—then his expression shifted.
Fury.
Deep. Visceral. Something that made his eyes flash, his face go rigid, his fists tremble slightly at his sides as he stared at me like he could barely breathe.
“She’s my daughter?”
“Now you want to know?”
“I have a right to know!”
“And she had a right to grow up without being hated by a man who never wanted her!”
“So you hid her from me for five years?” His voice was controlled, but it shook with the effort. “You had my child and decided I didn’t have the right to know?” He stepped toward me. “How dare you, Valentina?”
“How dare I?” I shot back, voice rising, my face burning with outrage. “You abandoned me, Enrico.” The words came out like knives. “You rejected me—without even looking back.” I lowered my voice, but it cut just as deep. “And now you think you get to demand anything from me?” I pointed at him, shaking. “You lost every right you might’ve had the second you called me a whore in front of a packed church!”
He stared at me for several endless seconds, hatred in his eyes mixing with something I didn’t want to understand.
Then he spoke, voice low and deadly.
“This isn’t over, Valentina. You stole five years of my daughter’s life.” His gaze burned. “If you think I’m going to let that go, you have no idea who I really am.”
My breathing came fast, sharp.
But I wasn’t going to keep this going with Clara awake in the next room.
I had made my daughter a promise.
She was my priority.
“Enough, Enrico,” I said firmly, pointing to the door behind him. “I didn’t steal anything. You wasted it.” My voice didn’t shake this time. “Now get out of my house. I have nothing else to say to you tonight.”
He stood still for a moment, like he was considering defying me.
Then he gave me one last look—one that felt like a thousand promises—and turned away. His footsteps were heavy down the hallway. The front door opened.
Then shut.
I rushed to lock it, pressing my back against it afterward with too much force, trembling against the cold wood.
I closed my eyes, trying to stop the tears that came again—silent, painful, unstoppable.
This had to be a nightmare.
Please, God—let it be a nightmare.
But deep in my heart, what hurt the most was the certainty that it wasn’t.
THIRTEEN
ENRICO FERRARA
The silence inside the car was heavy—almost suffocating—filled only by the harsh sound of my own uneven breathing.
My hands crushed the steering wheel as I drove too fast through the empty streets of the small town, fleeing that house, that woman—
that girl.
